Stormy weather a royal pain for city commuters, travelers

Wednesday

Jan 22, 2014 at 2:00 AMJan 22, 2014 at 7:37 AM

PHILADELPHIA — A swirling storm with the potential for more than a foot of snow clobbered the mid-Atlantic and the urban Northeast on Tuesday, grounding thousands of flights, closing government offices in the nation's capital and making a mess of the evening commute.

The Associated Press

PHILADELPHIA — A swirling storm with the potential for more than a foot of snow clobbered the mid-Atlantic and the urban Northeast on Tuesday, grounding thousands of flights, closing government offices in the nation's capital and making a mess of the evening commute.

The storm stretched 1,000 miles between Kentucky and Massachusetts but hit especially hard along the heavily populated Interstate 95 corridor between Philadelphia and Boston, creating a perilous ride home for millions of motorists.

The snow came down harder and faster than many people expected. Forecasters said some places could get 1 to 2 inches an hour, with wind gusts up to 50 mph. A blizzard warning was posted for parts of Massachusetts, including Cape Cod.

Late in the afternoon, highways in the New York City metropolitan area were jammed, and blowing snow tripled or even quadrupled drive times.

"I just want to get to the Bronx," motorist Peter Neuwens lamented. "It's a big place. Why can't I get there?" In Jersey City, N.J., Stanley Gaines, wearing just a thin jacket and huddling beneath an overhang as snow stung his face, said he had been stuck for more than an hour waiting for a ride home from his appointment at a Veterans Affairs clinic.

"I'm waiting on anything I can get: a taxi, a shuttle, a bus," Gaines said, squinting to read the destination on an approaching bus in near white-out conditions. "I didn't really pay attention to the weather this morning because there was no snow on the ground, and now — this!"

In White Plains, Anthony Schirrone pulled over his car to scrape snow from the windshield.

"I just did this five minutes ago," he said. "But it's coming down too fast." The storm was blamed for at least one death in Maryland after a car fishtailed into the path of a tractor-trailer on a snow-covered road about 50 miles northwest of Baltimore. The car's driver was thrown from the vehicle.

Forecasters said the storm could bring 10 to 14 inches of snow to Philadelphia and southern New England and up to a foot in New York City, to be followed by bitter cold as arctic air from Canada streams in. Washington was expecting 4 to 8 inches.

This one was a conventional storm that developed off the coast and moved its way up the Eastern Seaboard, pulling in cold air from the arctic. Unlike the epic freeze of two weeks ago, it was not caused by a kink in the polar vortex, the winds that circulate around the North Pole.

Pennsylvania's Transportation Department said it had already blown through more than half of its $189 million winter weather budget.

"Lots of nuisance storms this season have meant that PennDOT crews have been plowing and treating roads more frequently this winter," spokeswoman Erin Waters-Trasatt said.

About 3,000 flights Tuesday were canceled, with airports from Washington to Boston affected. More than 1,000 flights for Wednesday were called off as well. Amtrak planned to cut back train service in the afternoon.

The rush to get home early by many workers was evident in Philadelphia, where many commuter trains were packed.

The storm put a damper on New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie's inauguration, forcing the cancellation of an evening party on Ellis Island.